1. Field of Invention
The present invention relates to a cushioning device, and more particularly to a padding protective arrangement which is capable of encircling on a rim of furniture for providing a cushioning effect for preventing injury when a user accidentally hits that furniture.
2. Description of Related Arts
Conventional furniture, such as a conventional table, usually comprises a rim which is capable of causing severe injury when people, especially children, accidentally hit it. As a matter of fact, some parents may enclose the rim of the furniture by something which possesses certain amount of cushioning effect in order to prevent their children from being injured by the furniture. For example, some parents may enclose the furniture's rim by some sorts of plastic bands for softening the hardness of the rim in order to prevent their children from being accidentally injured.
On the other hand, some furniture manufacturers try to resolve this problem by filleting any sharp edges or corners present on their furniture so as to minimize the chance of causing accidents. Moreover, filleting any sharp corners or edges may enhance the sales of the relevant furniture because customers may after all prefer to buy furniture which is safer to their family members, especially children.
A major problem for the above-mentioned strategies in reducing the risk of accidental injury is that they may not be effective or desirable. For example, while enclosing the furniture's rim may actually reduce some risk of accidental injury, children may nevertheless get injured when hitting on the rim. On the other hand, enclosing the furniture's rim with plastic band may severely undermine the overall aesthetic effect of the furniture so that it may simply not be desirable, especially when the furniture is expensive and famous for its design. Therefore, in this scenario, there exists a tension between preserving furniture's design and reducing the risk of accidental injury.
With regards to the second practice (filleting of furniture's rim), it will not only increase the manufacturing cost of the furniture, but also limit the number of design which may be incorporated into the furniture because only filleted edges or corners are allowed. What is the most important point to raise here however, is that filleting the edges and corners of the relevant furniture does not necessarily has the effect of reducing the risk of accidental injury where children carelessly hit those edges or corners. In fact, those filleted edges and corners are still made of rigid (or even very hard) materials which may still be possible to inflict grievous bodily harm to people, especially children.